He was protesting the early morning Tuesday raid on the Occupy Oakland camp in front of City Hall, about a yard from where he lay in front of a police skirmish line less than 24 hours after the raid. Authorities are still trying to determine which of the 18 law enforcement agencies called in to assist the Oakland Police Department (OPD) during the raid and protest threw the flash grenade at Olsen as his fellow Occupy Oakland protesters tried to aide him.

But the heavy-handed tactics that resulted in Olsen's hospitalisation – he is still in critical condition – may cost Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, her righthand administrator, Deanna Santana, and Acting Police Chief Howard Jordan their jobs. The blunder and apparent lack of coordination between the city's leaders helped turn Occupy Oakland from a tenuous collection of protesters into a grassroots movement whose members have pledged to shut down the city on 2 November.

Oakland describes itself as having a "strong mayor" form of city government. But Quan spent much of Wednesday distancing herself from the aftermath of the early-morning Tuesday raid on the Occupy Oakland camp, which led to some 100 arrests and perhaps a dozen injuries.

Jordan said he could not speak for the back-up agencies, but Oakland police will use tear gas and bean bags to break up demonstrations if protesters ignore officers' order to disperse or if they pose a threat. All it takes is a bottle thrown at police for officers to react. Their reaction sets of an explosion of confrontation with protesters being thrown to the ground, dragged away or smacked with a baton.

But reports immediately surfaced that even peaceful protesters who complied were injured. One officer tore the camera out of a newspaper cameraman's hands, then shot him with a bean bag during the protest.

Jordan, nevertheless, praised his police officers for their professionalism. But his calm demeanor Wednesday belied deep schisms between the police and the mayor. The Oakland police union opposed her during the mayoral race and endorsed her opponent, former California Senator Don Perata. The force's relationship with Quan has worsened with each major decision about policing policies that involved the mayor.

Finally, the former police chief Anthony Batts resigned several weeks ago, in part because Quan had stifled several violence-prevention tactics which he favored, such as gang injunctions. Jordan's relationship with Quan at least lacks the bitterness that helped drive out his former boss. But that may have changed with Quan's claim that her police chief bore partial responsibility for the public relations nightmare she is experiencing because of the protest.

Quan told reporters that she authorised police to break up the camp because it was a safety and health hazard. But she said she did not know the sweep would happen Tuesday when she was in Washington, DC, looking for federal dollars. "I don't do the tactical planning," she said during Wednesday's news conference.

She certainly did not expect the protests that night, which she watched unfold, sleep-deprived and transfixed, on television from Washington, DC. Either Santana and Jordan failed to keep the mayor informed of the details of the raid and subsequent protest – unless Quan is not being completely forthcoming. Either way, she is ducking responsibility.

Olsen's injury will very likely result in a lawsuit against Oakland, one of numerous cases against police here for excessive force that the city settles every year. That said, police did the job with which they were tasked: they cleared the Occupy Oakland camp of residents using the tactics they learn from Day 1 of their training. If Jordan failed, it was in making sure that all 18 agencies complied with his city's policies on use of force. In turn, Santana should have communicated better with her boss.

But Quan could have stepped in with an alternative to the raid. Had she been in Oakland, or at least monitoring the situation more closely, she could have given orders to draw down police presence, instead of ratcheting up the tension by putting hundreds of police on the ground during the march.

Now, Oakland has become a national media spectacle of protest and police brutality. And Quan's hold on power looks dangerously thin.